Agenda item

Report of the Director of Housing and Director of Property Management.

At this DMC round, members have asked that the report includes performance information to understand and seek to improve contractor performance and address tenants and residents’ concerns. Areas for focus are rent arrears, repairs, major works and fire safety, CCTV upgrades, caretaking, grounds maintenance and complaints.

DMCs are asked to comment on the reports, and highlight any area for further discussion.

Consideration was given to a report of the Director of Housing and the Director of Property Management.

The Neighbourhood Manager, Nilva Thompson, introduced the report and highlighted the new Neighbourhoods Service that brought together sections that formerly were distinct and had different titles.

The Head of Finance (Supporting Communities), Michael Webb, spoke to the HRA budget monitoring section. Members were informed that there had been an overspent of about £12 million in the HRA for 2022-23. This was mainly due to rising energy costs and the cost of repairs. The 2023-24 forecast was for an overspend of £6.8 million. A large portion of this was increased interest costs following the recent Bank of England base rate rises.

Members voiced concern about the reduction in the rent collection percentage from 97.4% to 94.7% and the ensuing growth in rent arrears.

Members queried the cost of disrepair cases. The Repairs Manager said that there had been an increase in the number of disrepair cases from the pre-pandemic level, some of which flowed from solicitors advertising to tenants their ability to take out disrepair cases against the Council.  He said that the average cost of a disrepair case was £5000 and they were trying to reduce this cost by establishing a new team to focus on these cases and to encourage mediation.

Camden had just over 700 disrepairs cases, compared to 400 to 500 pre-pandemic. This was fewer than some other local authorities had, as Lambeth had 2000 cases outstanding!

Residents were dissatisfied with poor performance by contractors. They felt they had no recourse when contractors did poor-quality work or left jobs half-finished.

A representative from Alexandra and Ainsworth expressed concern about the wood used for railings being too narrow and not being replaced on a like-for-like basis. There was unfinished work on the children’s playground.

A resident from Brassey Road TRA said that damaged metal netting had not been actioned. A question was asked as to whether reporting this was part of the job of caretakers. Officers said that caretakers should report damage that needed to be repaired on their estate when they noticed it.

A resident from Bray TRA expressed the view that the internal works being undertaken were not being done to a high-quality. He also said that some of the work being done on the Chalcots was not fire-related, and that there needed to be clarity about what was being done for fire safety purposes and what was being done for other reasons.

A representative from Hilgrove Estate highlighted that there had been significant delays in repairing a lift on his estate. He had been led to believe that a reason for the delay was that they were waiting for a spare part from Italy. He said it would be better if parts could be sourced locally and this would avoid excessive delays in getting lift repairs done.

A resident from Westcroft Close TRA highlighted outstanding repairs on his estate. There was a garden fence which had not been fixed.

A leaseholder voiced frustration with long call waiting times to get through to landlord services.

RESOLVED –

THAT the report and the comments above be noted.